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Events During the Week of September 7th through September 14th, 2014

Monday, September 8th, 2014

Plasma Physics (Physics/ECE/NE 922) Seminar
In pursuit of Ignition - recent progress and directions at the National Ignition Facility
Time: 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm
Place: 1025 Engineering Centers Building
Speaker: John Edwards, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Abstract: Dr. John Edwards, associate NIF director for inertial confinement fusion (ICF) and high-energy-density (HED) science, has been responsible for defining the direction of ICF and HED experiments on NIF. Dr. Edwards has more than 20 years of experience in laser-driven ICF target physics and laboratory HED physics. He earned his Ph.D. in 1990 from Imperial College in London. During his graduate study, he conducted laser plasma physics experiments and developed an interest in simulation.

Dr. Edwards then joined the UK's Atomic Weapons Research Establishment as a HED experimental designer. He later served as the group leader for HED physics and was responsible for defining research directions. He joined the Weapons and Complex Integration Directorate at LLNL in 1998, and over the next five years, laid much of the foundation for the HED laser program in place today. Dr. Edwards then turned his focus almost entirely to ICF, leading groups in most aspects of the target physics, and later serving as the ignition team leader.
Host: Carl Sovinec
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Cosmology Journal Club
An Informal discussion about a broad variety of arXiv papers related to Cosmology
Time: 12:15 pm
Place: 5242 Chamberlin Hall
Abstract: Please visit the following link for more details:
    http://cmb.physics.wisc.edu/journal/index.html
Please feel free to bring your lunch!
If you have questions or comments about this journal club, would like to propose a topic or volunteer to introduce a paper, please email Le Zhang (lzhang263@wisc.edu)
Host: Peter Timbie
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Plasma Physics (Physics/ECE/NE 922) Seminar
A parametric study of extended MHD effects on interchange modes in spheromak equilibria
Time: 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Place: 514 ERB
Speaker: Eric Howell, University of Wisconsin Madison
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Tuesday, September 9th, 2014

Chaos & Complex Systems Seminar
Upstairs/downstairs in our brains - What’s running our show?
Time: 12:05 pm - 1:00 pm
Place: 4274 Chamberlin Hall (Refreshments will be served)
Speaker: Deric Bownds, UW Department of Zoology
Abstract: This talk starts with some brief brain 101 elementary anatomy and then offers a cherry picking review of recent trends in brain systems research that correlate what is going on in our brains with our behaviors. We want to know what normally makes us tick, what distortions might underlie addictive, impulsive, aggressive, stressed, depressed, or anxious behaviors, and what therapies might counter these distortions. I will focus on structure-activity-behavior correlations in three brain state distinctions that are currently being emphasized: Upstairs/downstairs and attentional/default mode systems that are a spontaneous part of our normal behavioral repertoire, and the cognitive therapy or meditation systems whose training, development, and expression can alter them.
Host: Clint Sprott
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Theory Seminar (High Energy/Cosmology)
Search for LFV Higgs decays with the CMS experiment
Time: 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Place: 5280 Chamberlin Hall
Speaker: Maria Cepeda Hermida, University of Wisconsin
Abstract: The CMS experiment at the LHC performed the first direct search for lepton violating decays of the recently discovered Higgs boson, to a muon-tau pair. These decays are forbidden in the standard model, but arise naturally in beyond the standard scenarios such as models with more than one Higgs doublet, composite Higgs models, Randall-Sundrum models, and many others. The search is performed in the h->mu tau_e and h->mu tau_had channels, where tau_had and tau_e are taus reconstructed in the hadronic and electronic decay channels, respectively. The data sample used in the search corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 19.7 fb-1 collected in pp collisions at 8 TeV. The sensitivity of the search is an order of magnitude better than the existing indirect limits. A slightly excess of data with a significance of 2.5 sigma is observed. This results constrain the branching ratio of h->mu tau to < 1.57% at 95% CL. This branching ratio limit is then used to constrain the Y(mu tau) Yukawa couplings.
Host: Ran Lu
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Wednesday, September 10th, 2014

No events scheduled

Thursday, September 11th, 2014

NPAC (Nuclear/Particle/Astro/Cosmo) Forum
Studying Atmospheric Neutrino Oscillation at PINGU
Time: 2:30 pm - 3:30 pm
Place: 5280 Chamberlin
Speaker: Kaoru Hagiwara, KEK
Abstract:
Slides: [PDF]
Host: Barger
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Astronomy Colloquium
Probing the Origin of Supermassive Black Holes with Dwarf Galaxies
Time: 3:30 pm - 5:00 pm
Place: 4421 Sterling Hall
Speaker: Amy Reines, NRAO
Abstract: Supermassive black holes (BHs) live at the heart of essentially all massive galaxies with bulges, power AGN, and are thought to be important agents in the evolution of their hosts. However, the origin of the first supermassive BH &quot;seeds&quot; is far from understood. While direct observations of these distant BHs in the infant Universe are unobtainable with current capabilities, massive BHs in present-day dwarf galaxies offer another avenue to observationally constrain the masses, host galaxies and formation path of supermassive BH seeds. Using optical spectroscopy from the SDSS, we have increased the number of known dwarf galaxies hosting massive BHs by more than an order of magnitude. These dwarf galaxies have stellar masses comparable to the Magellanic Clouds and contain some of the least-massive supermassive BHs known. I will present results from this study, and well as on-going efforts using radio and X-ray observations to reveal massive BHs in star-forming dwarfs that can be missed by optical diagnostics.
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Graduate Introductory Seminar
Plasma Physics
Time: 4:30 pm - 5:30 pm
Place: 5280 Chamberlin Hall
Speaker: Boldyrev, Egedal, Forest, Sarff, Terry, Zweibel
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Friday, September 12th, 2014

No events scheduled